MORGANTOWN — No matter how long Steve Sabins’ tenure as West Virginia’s baseball coach lasts, he may never win another game like the Mountaineers won Friday night inside John Euliano Park in Orlando, Fla.
The 14th-ranked Mountaineers took down UCF, 4-1, to maintain their two-game lead in the Big 12 standings.
They did so with just one hit. It didn’t come until the seventh inning.
UCF (23-18, 6-13 Big 12) finished with nine hits, but stranded 11 runners, including leaving the bases loaded in the eighth inning.
Just how were the Mountaineers (35-5, 14-3) able to pull this one off?
It simply was a matter of taking advantage of the right opportunities.
Like the fact four UCF pitchers combined for four walks and hit six more WVU batters.
All of them seemingly played a role for the Mountaineers to play small ball.
In the fifth inning, in what was a scoreless game to that point, WVU’s Spencer Barnett lifted a fly ball to center for a sacrifice fly that scored Grant Hussey for a 1-0 lead. Hussey was hit by a pitch, advanced to second when Brodie Kresser was also hit by a pitch and took third when Gavin Kelly walked.
In the seventh inning, Kresser hit a sacrifice fly that scored Armani Guzman.
Kyle West hit a one-out single — the Mountaineers’ only hit of the game — and Guzman pinch ran for him.
Hussey walked and both players pulled off a double steal, setting up Kresser’s RBI flyout for a 2-1 lead.
WVU tacked on two more in the eighth, when Chase Swain reached on an error and Skylar King was hit by a pitch.
Logan Sauve walked to load the bases and Sam White hit a sacrifice fly to center to score Swain.
Jace Rineart followed with a ground ball to the shortstop that scored King.
All four runs scored while WVU went 0 for 9 with runners on base and 0 for 4 with runners in scoring position.
The rest was left up to WVU pitchers. Starter Griffin Kirn went 4 2/3 innings, allowing one run on an RBI single from DeAmez Ross.
Reese Bassinger, Chase Meyer and Carson Estridge picked it up from there, combining for 4 1/3 innings of scoreless ball, while allowing five hits.
Meyer got himself out of a jam in the eighth. He gave up two singles to open the inning and then walked Lex Boedicker.
Meyer then struck out the next two hitters and then ended the inning on a ground ball to second base.
Bassinger picked up his fifth win of the season, while Estridge earned his fourth save with a scoreless ninth. He did allow a walk and hit another batter to open the inning, but he struck out Antonio Jimenez and then got a game-ending double play on a ground ball to the shortstop.
